Getting Started with the Greatest Investment Ever

Written by Ken McElroy | Monday, January 20, 2014

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I am not shy in sharing my belief that real estate is the greatest investment ever, and that anyone can succeed in real estate. This belief mixed with my desire to teach has lead me to receive hundreds of phone calls and emails about real estate investing every week. It can be a bit overwhelming.

This is why I’ve created KenFlix. KenFlix gives you all the answers for real estate investing that I and my team have discovered after decades of investing and hundreds of millions of dollars invested. One of the more common questions I receive is about getting started.

How to get started is a great question. Most people fall on their face because they don’t have three things:

A clear set of goals,

A team, and

Knowledge of market trends.

Goals:

Goal power is the power you feel when you’ve set a target and you concentrate all your efforts on hitting it. It makes you focused. It makes you decisive. And it ultimately makes you successful.

Goals cannot be vague and must be measured. Goals must be realistic and attainable; otherwise they will either be shelved and never acted upon triggering feelings of failure.

I made a decision a long time ago not to risk my future on wishes and dreams. Instead I got smart and set goals.

Team:

Having a team of experts on call is not free and it’s not cheap. Those are the two biggest reasons why many inexperienced investors make a rookie mistake: They try to do almost everything themselves. Sure, they may save a few dollars in the short run, but they usually lose in the long run.

Without experts on your team, deals take longer to find, evaluate, and close, so there’s the value of your time and the loss of valuable opportunities. Do-it-yourselfers miss details the experts would see in a minute that can cost them everything.

An expert team limits your surprises and protects your investment.

Market:

The market is more important than the property.

The objective with market research is to get an accurate read on the supply and demand in the area. Supply is simply the number of rental properties available. Demand is the number people looking to rent.

There are three drivers of a market’s supply and demand. The first, and most important, is employment. It is a fact that population follows employment.

The second driver is population. People certainly go where the jobs are, but they also migrate to places that have certain persona or living experience built into the area. Look in markets where the population trend is growing.

After employment and population growth I look for location. Great locations have drive-by visibility. Great locations possess a one-of-a-kind quality. And great locations are in demand. This does not mean they are unaffordable. Affordability is everywhere, even in the ‘hottest’ neighborhoods.

Remember, real estate is the greatest investment ever, and that anyone can succeed in real estate, that means you. If you need knowledge and you want to learn from me, join my KenFlix community and get all of my knowledge for less than the cost of a book. You can learn more at www.kenmcelroy.com.